Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Colorado is my kind of place!

Family trip to Snow Mountain Ranch 
This is our 5th time to YMCA of the Rockies. 

This is our 5 bedroom house we stayed in. Plenty of bunk beds and room for all 12 of us.
 Nama and Poppy enjoyed the whole trip. All the fun memories we made and excitement throughout the week. So many stories and hundreds of pictures...
Here we are on a hike to the waterfalls. Total 3 miles there and back.

Cousins:
Mattie Sue and Ryan

Malyn with her milk shake that Poppy treated everyone to. 

Sammy, our warrior that let all the bears know where we were so they stayed away until Sammy went to sleep.

Eli was full of smiles and was a real trooper! He loved everything and touched everything. 

Look mom, no hands. Here is Stacy loving the Alpine Slide.

Auntie Jenny painted a picture with Mattie Sue, Ryan, and Malyn. She also had a paint night with me, Jessica, and Stacy. So fun, so talented, we are blessed.

Rod and Jessica getting ready to hike or was it Zip Line day?

Boo helping Malyn with her walking stick. This was one of my favorite things to do. 

Thanks dad our Mountain man. So glad you love it here and wanted to share it with us.

Five grandkids sitting on the bench on the wrap around porch.
Cousins making memories.

Poppy brought two of the binoculars and Malyn and Ryan loved looking for anything and everything that came near our cabin.

Thumbs up for Ryan and his sweet mom.

Ryan on the Zip Line at Winter Park.

Sammy on the Zip Line at Winter Park.

Ryan and Sammy playing knock down the pile of checkers we just piled up. 

Auntie Jenny and Mattie Sue heading up to the top of the Alpine Slide.


Ryan jumping on the trampoline.

Chesley and Jessica after making walking sticks. 

Great pizza dinner after our day at Winter Park.
Boo was called back to shot the "Gray's Anatomy" episode.  That was sad he had to go but glad he got the part.

All of us were taking a well needed break and hoping that the waterfalls was going to be worth it. 
Yes we are as pooped as we look. 

It was worth it. Sammy and Eli are a little more refreshed as they traveled up to the falls on their dad's back. :) Rod gave Mattie Sue, Malyn, and Ryan the last few yards up on his back. 

Mattie Sue's painting she did with Auntie Jenny. :) Only half done. I'll try to get each picture posted. 

This would be the famous bear that visited us our first 3 nights. Chesley sat in his car the second night with camera in hand waiting for the bear to check out what we had for dinner that night. 
I might add on the first night he came, I opened the door that was 15 feet away from him and we checked each other out. Eye to eye contact. WHAT WAS I THINKING??? I also pushed Chesley and Stacy out the door and pulled them back just as fast. I wanted someone else to witness that the bear was really there.Turned out he was more interested in the food and not us.

Adult Zip Line: I'll go first (Jessica) That's my girl, step right up! No fear!

and down they go one by one....

Poppy with his crew and their walking sticks.

Got a glimpse of the actor (Boo Arnold's wife. Stacy) walking through the park with her milk shake. Son, Eli watches on as he is hoping for a taste of the rich chocolate thick shake. Will she share?


Precious Mattie Sue with brother Eli and sister Malyn near the falls.

Arnold's loving nature.


 Love these girls! I have a picture I took of them like this 24 yrs ago. 

Thank you family for wanting to go with dad and I. That was the most precious gift of all. We did have some laughs and although we adults had to spread out to sleep with the scared kids from the bear it was still an enjoyable trip.
I'll pass on the condo at the beach or the lake house on the lake. Give me a cabin in the mountains and I'll be in heaven.

Monday, July 16, 2012

HAPPINESS IS:

FOURTH OF JULY
 WATCHING A PARADE AND WAVING A FLAG. OR SITTING ON A PORCH HOLDING A FLAG. :)

WATCHING THE 4TH OF JULY PARADE WITH A FRIEND.

HOMEMADE SHIRTS BY MOM WITH FLAGS AND STARS. 

KRISPY KREAM DONUTS AND COLD MILK.

MAKING 103 POINTS ON ONE WORD IN WORDS FOR FRIENDS.

JESSICA AND HER CAR

JENNY'S NEW JEEP

AUNTIE JENNY'S LOVE AND HUGS...
AND A PUPPET BLANKET.

LOSING YOUR ADENOIDS, WITH MOM (AND AN iPAD) RIGHT THERE AND POPSICLES AND ICE CREAM WAITING FOR THE BRAVE LITTLE BOY TO COME HOME.

GOING TO THE MOVIE WITH MY MOM AND THEN TO OLIVE GARDEN AND HAVING LEFT OVERS FOR NEXT DAY. 

MOST OF ALL HAPPINESS IS KISSES FROM MATTIE SUE AND MALYN AND A FRIEND, SIENA. 
JUST A FEW MORE WEEKS AND WE'LL BE GETTING THOSE KISSES IN PERSON. 

Friday, July 13, 2012

A fun summer...

My cousin had twins two days before my birthday. Two girls. Hooray for girls.
 Abigail, Brynn, and Theresa
 My Uncle Frank, The twins grandpa. He'll be great. Little overwhelming!


CAMP NAMA for a week.
We saw "Brave" 
 in 3D. 
When the big bear comes out Ryan put his stuff on the seat next to him and got up and started to walk out and said, this is scary Nama. I said come sit on my lap and we'll wait and see if the things turn around and everything works out. 
We did and it did!!!

Afternoon at Nama Dotty's house.
Ryan: "Nama Dotty, your house is AWSOME" 
He looked at everything through her big magnifying glass.

We had lunch with sandwiches cut into shapes.  


And Ryan was in charge of timing the home made cookies. Yes boys put the timer on top of their heads. Why do you ask? 

Cookies are ready and Ryan takes charge and gets them ready for Nama Dotty and me.

Then we need to do a few jumping excises. This is the leap and...
  
Jump.

Then we went straight into the pool at Nama Dotty's pool.
She gave him a little red ball and he jumped in to retrieve it, maybe 50 times. Rested then started all over again.

In and out. He'd get out and bounce the ball high in the air and it would land in the water and he would look for it and jump in and retrieve it. Maybe he was a golden retriever in his last life. J/K.

Never to tired to help. He takes good care of his Nama's.

Ryan ran some errands with me. Here he's getting Boo's mail.
Funny how this was a big deal. But he loves his Uncle Boo so doing something like this was extra special.

Didn't see the chipmunk movie but saw the little guys there.

Didn't see Spiderman movie but saw the poster and Ryan thought it might be a good idea to take a picture with Spiderman.

Poppy and Ryan heading out to his last day at Vacation Bible School.

My buddy for a week. 
Such a fun week.

Chesley and I took Ryan to VBS the last day and walked around after dropping him off. Here is what we came across. No wonder Ryan had the time of his life.
 Chesley may have enjoyed walking around with Ryan a couple of days. Maybe next year.

We did other fun things but sometimes you just have to leave the camera / iPhone in your purse!!!!